


let's not talk about love

by giselleslash



Series: Prompt Fics [3]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: F/M, Half-Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-01
Updated: 2012-07-01
Packaged: 2017-11-08 23:12:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/448611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giselleslash/pseuds/giselleslash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Third in a series of word/song prompts given to me by my Livejournal friends' list.</p>
            </blockquote>





	let's not talk about love

**Author's Note:**

> Based on [this](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R20cTgy03qM) song prompt.

Arthur could still remember what Morgana tasted like. She’d been sweeter than any of the treats Arthur remembered stealing from platters at harvest feasts when he was young. Her lips untried, untasted, by anyone except for Arthur and he remembered that; her secret shyness, her gradual giving in, everything that had made him more than slightly mad for her.

But underneath it all had been just the smallest bitterness, only an aftertaste, really, but it had been there and Arthur remembered that too.

Watching her now as she crossed the room towards him, sword in hand, prepared to slice him through, he brought to mind the sunlight on the inside of her thigh and the way her breasts fit his hands just right. He wanted to press his hand to her chest like he used to just to feel her heart pound as it had when they’d snuck out into the woods beyond Camelot, how it pounded and beat with a fierceness that brought Arthur to his knees. He wanted to feel her skin and know it felt as it had when she was fifteen because maybe then he could forgive her for all the things that followed.

Perhaps he already did.

He put himself in her place and his heart ached and he wondered how that small bitterness inside her had slowly grown all those years, how it must have festered and rotted and caused her endless pain.

He didn’t want to know that. He didn’t want to know all the things, all the hurt she’d kept inside, kept from _him_ , the person who had loved her. He knew countless things about her; the way she’d pulled her skirts aside and straddled him that first time in the woods, the way she pretended to be fearless but was scared and small and curled against Arthur’s narrow chest when he’d thrown his arms around her in shock and awkwardness, and the way she’d sighed when he’d told her she would always have him. Always.

He knew countless things about her, and yet, nothing at all.

He watched as Leon stepped between them, stood his ground against his Lady Morgana even as he apologized for his trespass. Leon’s loyal reverence made her take a misstep and in his mind’s eye they were fourteen and dancing and her belittling rang in his ear as she blamed him for every stumble she took.

Arthur wished, just for a moment, that he had it in him to give up his kingdom for her, to make her happy, or whatever it was in her that had taken over what used to be her joy.

“Leon, no,” Arthur heard himself speak before he’d realized he’d done so and he saw Morgana close her eyes at the sound of his voice.

“He wants me all to himself,” she said with such hostility it made the air collapse around them all. “Always the first into the fray, always so courageous and true. What a king you are, Arthur.”

With barely held restraint Leon stepped aside and she passed by him, sword still in hand. Arthur let her walk right up to him, to step close enough to him that he could feel the faint wisps of her breath.

“Why, Morgana?” he whispered.

“You don’t deserve an answer if you have to ask.”

Arthur tried not to let her hate burn him.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Two words and he watched Morgana crack, she was so brittle, why did no one else see that? Everyone put thoughts and deeds and desires into her mouth and mind, but Arthur knew all she had ever wanted was to be wanted, to be made real.

She gathered herself up and hardened her eyes. “You give an apology that’s not yours to give.”

“But I give it all the same.” Arthur took a step closer to her and dared to lean down and press his forehead to her temple. “We could have done this together,” he breathed against her cheek, “just as we’d always planned.”

She turned into him and he could feel the war raging inside her, it came off of her in waves.

“Uther made that impossible,” she hissed. “He made us an abomination.”

Arthur wanted to tell her that didn’t matter, but it did. All of it mattered. Instead he sighed, relieved in an awful way to know she remembered, that he hadn’t made it all up; those first fumblings, those sweet kisses, the freckle on the back of her knee, the fact he’d given her his heart and she’d happily swallowed it down.

“Ah, so you did love me. Once,” he whispered in her ear.

She took a sharp step back from him, rage heated up the air around them, made it crackle and moan.

“Of course I love you,” she screamed at him and he knew she failed to realize she’d put her love in the present still. “But everything is wrong. I’m wrong. This is my due and you will not take that away from me. It’s mine.”

He wanted to tell her that he never would have, but the ground beneath them started to shake under the weight of her screams. Pieces of the walls started to crumble at their feet as she raised her sword to him, and before he could pull his own to block Morgana’s blow he felt Merlin’s arm around his waist pulling him back and heard Leon’s shouts telling him to run. He tripped as he turned to run, to follow his men, whom he had forgotten existed for those few moments when it was him and Morgana and the weight of their past.

The last he saw of her was a fury of darkness and pale skin and tears as she screamed his name and the ceiling of the throne room fell to the ground between them. It was an image he did not want and he knew, with time, he would will it into one that better suited her.

And she’d still be his.


End file.
